Oaklawn Foundation gifts ASMSA $100,000 for Selig Hall renovation
The Oaklawn Foundation on Thursday awarded a $100,000 grant to the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences, and the Arts for the Selig Hall renovation project.
A special ceremony was held inside Selig Hall Auditorium, where Oaklawn Foundation Chair Sam Stathakis presented ASMSA Director Corey Alderdice with the donation.
After completion of a $5.5 million renovation project last October, ASMSA dedicated Selig Hall in honor of the late Helen Selig, a former mayor of Hot Springs who was instrumental in establishing the school locally in 1993.
Once the former St. Joseph’s Hospital convent and chapel complex, the space now serves as residential housing for students and a mental health hub for professional counseling. It also houses the new student union and auditorium.
“While ASMSA is an institution that serves the entire state of Arkansas, I can’t think of a place that we would be more proud to call home than Hot Springs,” Alderdice said following the ceremony.
“And nothing is more synonymous with Hot Springs than Oaklawn, its legacy and its broader support in the community. So for us to continue to enjoy the support of the Oaklawn Foundation reinforces the role that we play in Hot Springs, but also the importance of partnerships, especially when it comes to education,” he said.
In December 2016, the foundation presented ASMSA with its largest single gift in the school’s history, donating $300,000 to help build a $4.5 million Creativity and Innovation Complex.
Alderdice said the foundation’s support was “absolutely critical” in opening the complex.
“First with that gift announcement in 2016 at the outset of the project, and when we opened the doors in early 2019 for that. That project was the first new classroom building in the school’s history — 25-year history at the time — and was one of the largest shows of private support,” he said. “So it was that gift from the Oaklawn Foundation and the challenge it created for others that helped provide a
total of three-quarters of a million dollars in private support for that project alone.
“So again, it’s just the Oaklawn Foundation’s generosity to groups like ASMSA, Mid-America Science Museum, and National Park College, but it’s the strength that builds for others in Hot Springs to step forward and say, ‘We want to be a part of the educational progress in this community.’”
Stathakis thanked the school for the opportunity to participate in its success, noting, “ASMSA has been a beacon not only for Hot Springs, but really for all of Arkansas.
“Number one, I’m honored to be chairman of the foundation this year,” he said. “The foundation was started years ago with the kindness of Oaklawn, and they give money to the foundation. They really have no participation in it; it’s totally foundation-ran. It really was designed on the onset for senior issues and educational issues.
“So this really fits into what we do as a foundation, to support great institutions like ASMSA. We had an opportunity to participate and give them a grant to really make this a beautiful hall and it fits our charge. So it’s just an honor for us to be able to do that and participate.”
Alderdice said 2023 marks an important occasion for the school as it enters its fourth decade of existence.
In April, ASMSA will celebrate 20 years as a campus of the University of Arkansas System. On Aug. 23, the school will kick off its 30th anniversary celebration — marking three decades to the day that class was held for the first time on campus.
Looking back through the history of school, he said one thing that strikes him is seeing the fulfillment of the original vision and long-term plan for the complex being a part of the school’s history. The renovation of Selig Hall, he noted, has allowed ASMSA to increase enrollment in its residential program by 10%.